Eyes Like Stars
by Prelude in Indigo
Summary: Her love illuminates her, and she is more beautiful in that moment than she's ever been before.


**Haha! Second HibariHana fic! . Third, if you count the one in Spanish. Yeah. I'm going to count it, cause three is more than two. Well, duh. :D**

**For your information, it's like, midnight. 0_o So forgive me my curtness.**

**It seems rather incomplete, but I wanted to post this, you know? I have to go back and edit the ending (seriously, it sucks) but I think it's definitely good enough to post.**

**Enjoy! :D**

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><p>Every night, as she looks up at the ceiling of her boring dark room and her boring plain house where she feels trapped and constrained, Hana wishes that she was up there.<p>

She thinks of the stars that burn brightly on, regardless of the emptiness that surrounds them, filled only by other stars, and thinks of how they are all stars- all people alone in a cold world but for each other; in a world where some shine more brightly than others, some are dim, and they all die.

Some will go out in a quiet, twinkling way, like a flash of sunlight against a metal edge, and some will go out in bright streaks of flame that burn their way across the nothingness and into nonexistence. Some people will burn so brightly that the ones who are left must quietly fizzle out.

The thought always makes her roll over and clutch her pillow in panic, because if there is anything Hana is afraid of it's that she will be stuck in this miserable, dim existence where all the stars around her burn so brightly that she is left to fizzle out on her own. While Kyoko plays her mafia games and Ryohei misses school and comes back with broken bones and missing teeth, Hana is left to worry about the people she loves.

No, she thinks, with a rush of desperateness. She does not like the idea of being a star, trapped inside the void of the world around her. Because Hana knows that she will not burn brightly, instead giving all she has to others.

Hana wants freedom.

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><p>He's never entertained thoughts of so much as even pretending to care about those around him- no girl, and no man.<p>

Kyoya knows that he needs no one; as much as others pretend to be close, so close that they are almost as one, every single person is fundementally alone; in control of their own emotions and desires and life. They are separate spheres of existence that collide messily with one another, and he hates this collision, this messiness.

He's determined that he will live his life free of that.

But some things are beyond his control.

He goes through his middle school years bumping into the herbivores that are starting to shape his life, and he absolutely hates it. Kyoya does not want let others control his life, and he refuses to let them control his life.

He will always be the strongest; and yet, there will be always be another restraint to break.

And then it happens.

Hana Kurokawa is nothing special; she is not someone who attracts attention, even though she wears her attitude like a pair of shoes, she adheres to the rules set out before her. This is why she's not particularly interesting to him; not as interesting as the boss herbivore or the bomber or the idiot or even the boxer who loves her.

In a strange way, despite this lack of interest, Kyoya respects her. She's quiet, studious, and not quite as herbivorous as the others, who seem to crowd around each other like rabbits.

And Kyoya's thoughts on her end there; there is nothing more to think of, nothing but that he cannot see why Ryohei is in love with her.

And then it happens, and he discovers why.

Ryohei's supposedly the fourth strongest fighter in the school and Kyoya is the first, and as much as he hates to admit it, the two are connected by family and Tsuna and the girl who Tsuna loves, the stupid herbivore with the detestable orange hair and annoyingly kind eyes. So it's not that big of a shock when an enemy decides that he will target the stupid herbivore with the stupid hair, and it's no surprise that Tsuna decides he will retrieve her.

It is a surprise- to everyone, even more so to Kyoya- when Hana, who knows nothing of their mafia or their life or fighting or even how to throw a punch, pleads with them to take her with them. It's quite frankly ridiculous; why would she put herself in danger for Kyoko Sasagawa, a brainless scrap of a girl with no talents to speak of?

Hana is brave, too brave, and she loves Kyoko, and he doesn't understand it at all.

And then- And then, the man is pointing his gun at Kyoko- and _oh god, they are not going to make it in time_; the guardians are too far away and they can see his trigger finger slowly, slowly pulling down, and Kyoya makes a run for it- and Hana, who has previously been unable to do anything but watch with fear in her eyes, throws herself in front of Kyoko; her arms wide and her face a pleasant mixture of desperation, determination, and happiness-

-_and she's beautiful_. Hana's always been beautiful, but right then, right at that moment, her love for her friends illuminates her, and she is as lovely as a midnight sky, with her hair like night and her porcelain white skin and her pink flower petal lips, and her wide silvery eyes like stars.

Kyoya falters; he's awestruck for the first time in his life, but then he realizes the gun is clicking and Hana is in the path, so he races forth and there is a thud, and the man is unconscious before he hits the ground.

Hana slumps in relief, and her silvery gray eyes slide shut, and Kyoya can do nothing but stand and stare.

Then there is a rush of people who surge past and around him while Kyoya sees Hana's shocking beauty vanish and fade into icy calm, and he does not move. It is almost like she vanishes.

Hana, Kyoya thinks, is terribly herbivorous, to sacrifice herself for another girl.

And still, he finds it hard to put this image out of his mind, of Hana with her arms thrown wide and face lovely and content.

Kyoya thinks back over the incident, combs his mind for some sort of reason that he would think of her like that, but the details of the picture are bland. Her lips are thin with fear and her skin is sickly pale with a light sheen of sweat and her pupils are small and her hair is damp and mussed. There is absolutely nothing special that he can remember, and Kyoya _hates_ it.

He seeks out Tsunayoshi, who is, strangely enough, someone who he is not embarrassed to speak to of such things, and who he trusts about as much as Kyoya trusts anyone who is not Tetsuya Kusakabe, and he backs the boy into a corner and demands to know whether Hana Kurokawa was always so beautiful.

He repeats the word in an almost dumfounded way and then, he says, **I suppose that she is beautiful, but, Hibari, you-**

**No**_,_ he snaps. Kyoya glares up at the ceiling of his beloved school and settles his hands on his tonfas because it relaxes him and says; **But when she put herself in front of that gun. Didn't she look different?**

**No**_._ And then Tsunayoshi adds, almost as an afterthought,**Hibari, do you maybe… **_**like**_** Hana…?**

It's an utterly ridiculous assumption and something about it makes Kyoya's stomach tighten, and it takes him aback that Tsunayoshi Sawada would even dare to suggest such a thing, and perhaps it's because he's so taken aback that he doesn't immediately beat the boy into a bloody mess. Instead Kyoya stops and he thinks while the world goes on around him and he wanders away without answering.

It is not quite fair that no one else seems to be as affected by the girl with the eyes like stars.

Kyoya's completely aggravated by this fact; it does absolutely nothing to improve his usually sour mood and he takes it out on the students of Nami High, and his reign of terror thus increases. He's absolutely _furious_, especially with himself, for seeing in Hana something that no on else does. And then Kyoya is furious with everyone else too because they _don't_ see it; because they can't, and it's entirely unfair.

Tetsuya Kusakabe notices; he can tell; but Kyoya's right hand and he seem to have a mutually unspoken agreement; that school life and personal life are two _very_ different things, no matter how much the line between the two may blur. But Kyoya _knows_ that _he_ knows and it's very near enough to drive him over the edge.

And she just _walks_ down the school halls like she is nothing special, like she doesn't know how she plagues his every thought, and it's enough, not to drive him over to the edge but very much enough to drive him to _madness_.

He takes Hana by her thin shoulders, she is _so thin_, and delicate, as if she is about to break any second- how can someone this thin be so brave? – and he presses her to the wall and she is not afraid, but her eyes do not look like stars.

**Why?** he snarls, anger surging through him and taking itself out in the pressure that he puts on her. **Why did you do that?**

She stares at him- it's such a cold stare, unnerving, and he thinks for a moment that Hana Kurokawa could be something like him, then Kyoya reprimands himself because there is absolutely _no one_ like him- and her lips move, making words that do not tell him anything about what he wants to know.

Kyoya shakes her, almost desperately; and he's rewarded with something akin to fear, or maybe just anger, and he says; **You would have died, sacrificing yourself for that herbivore.** Then he repeats it, because he's said it, but it's the first time he's even thought of it, and the thought makes him feel like his stomach has been carved out with a knife. **You would have died**.

And she really _is _angry now, and Hana swats his hand away and once more her gray eyes go bright. **Because she's my friend,** she spits out **, not that you'd know anything about **_**that**_**.**

He can't even focus on her words.

Gray.

It's a dull and interesting and halfway color, like it doesn't know just what it wants to be, and Kyoya's never found it particularly interesting because he's rather a boy of blacks and whites and wrong and right and extremes. But just then he's noticing all the things that are gray and beautiful, like the color of the sky just before dawn, before the sun taints it in oranges and pinks, and the color of a stormy ocean, and the color of clouds on a rainy day, and how gray is a color of waiting, and it really does make him feel alive.

Kyoya's no fool.

He realizes what's happening, what he feels for the girl with eyes like stars, and it's a feeling similar to both flying and being on a sinking ship with no way out, and Kyoya absolutely hates it-

-he does not want to be in love (love makes fools out of people) and he doesn't want to ever feel like he belongs to anyone but himself, and more than that he doesn't want to feel like anything is beyond his control, even though they already are. Love turns people into weaklings, destroys them, forces them to rely on others.

He finds her the next day and he doesn't harm her, despite the desperation he feels upon seeing her icy cold face- he wants something, he just doesn't know what- and he says **You did it because you love her.**

**I love her,** she responds, and she leans against the desk behind her in a deceptively casual gesture- deceptive, because Kyoya can _see_ the hesitance in her eyes. She's afraid of him. And then Hana goes on to spout something about how she doesn't love Kyoko Sasagawa like _love_ and Kyoya doesn't care.

He understands something.

Hana is weak. She is powerless despite her urge to protect Kyoko, and at the same time she's strong. She's strong _because she loves Kyoko_, and they're not the same at all. In loving Kyoya finds nothing but weakness and Hana finds nothing but strength.

She says this, more or less, in her soft and calm voice. **It's not a bad thing to love someone. It gives you strength, because you want to protect them.**

Kyoya does not want to love her.

He does want to love this midnight girl with her night-sky hair and her porcelain skin and her eyes like stars, but he does, and something in that one sentence changes his mind, makes him think _okay, maybe I can take a chance, maybe I can love_.

He turns around and he walks away, leaving Hana behind him in her plain classroom.

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><p>It's a wild rush of feelings and emotions he's never felt before when he finds himself climbing up the side of her house and knocking on her window, as if he is engaging in something forbidden to even he- and Kyoya's never felt like anything is off limits to even him, but this girl is.<p>

She slides the window open and sees him there, when he slips inside and sits on the windowsill, and Kyoya doesn't know why but she doesn't yell for help or call for her parents- he can only assume that it's because just as it's something forbidden for her as it is for him. He stares at Hana and she stares back and for a second, for that one moment, he thinks that _it's okay to be strong for someone else_.

And then- Kyoya asks her, asks what she wants more than anything else in the world.

And maybe it's because the stars are shining behind him and because she's half asleep and the world feels like it's entered some sort of half-way _almost-there_ gray state, but Hana looks at him with honesty in her silvery eyes and says **freedom**.

There's a whole lot of _maybes_ in the equation- maybe it _is_ okay to be in love, maybe he _can_ be stronger when it's for someone else, maybe Hana is not something he wants but something he needs, and they all make one huge Maybe that's the best _maybe_ he's ever had.

So Kyoya grabs Hana by the hand and he pulls her out of her window with him- she's wearing a nightgown and no shoes and her hair is loose and damp against her bare shoulders, but it doesn't matter right then- and pulls her off into the night and to a hill where-

-where they will lie and stare up at the stars in their bed of black velvet, and Kyoya will think a million things like _You are beautiful and your eyes are like stars and I want to protect you_, but all he will say is **you have eyes like stars** and all he will hope for is that it's enough for her to understand.

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><p><strong>Urgh. The OOC burns. Seriously. IT BURNNNNS.<strong>

**Well, I hope the formatting's okay. I don't usually write things in this sort of format, but I felt like it suited the story; you know? Sort of dreamy.**

**And, on a random note... When you type 'maybe' a bunch of times, it starts to look like nonsense. It really does. Urgh.**

**._. I hope this didn't suck too badly. And, oh, guys? Write some HibariHana for me, okay! I want to read some! I SWEAR, I will love you forever. Seriously. For, like, forever and ever and ever. And if you don't... ****I'll sic Mukuro on you! (Haha, I kid. If I could sic Mukuro on people, we'd be short on annoying male pop stars... ^^)**

**So, review! Review if you don't want me to sic Mukuro on you!**


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